from the have-fun-with-it dept

You may recall that about a year ago, Trent Reznor jokingly mentioned that 400 gigs of high definition video footage of some shows from Nine Inch Nail's previous tour had been released online "by a mysterious, shadowy group of subversives." Not only that, he noted "I'll bet some enterprising fans could assemble something pretty cool." Now, of course it was Rezor's own people who were "leaking" the content, but we'd been hearing all sorts of cool things about what they were doing, and on Christmas Eve they officially released what they had put together called "Another Version Of The Truth: The Gift." It's an amazing display of crowdsourced teamwork by a group calling itself "This One Is On Us," a play on Reznor's statement when he released "The Slip" as a completely free download, when he said "This one's on me."

As they note, it took 12 months, involving a "core team of dozens (with a network of thousands), spanning 3 continents, 4 languages, 5 specialist teams [and] countless sleepless nights." And what did they come out with? Well, it's a concert video that's available in pretty much any format you might want (and they're still adding more). In fact you'll soon be able to get it in Blu-ray. But in the meantime, you can get it in standard DVD of dual layer DVD formats. You can get it for the PS3 or as a basic .MOV file. There's a version catering to those who want to watch on an iPod, and (of course) it's on YouTube.

And as we're being told how awful BitTorrent is and how various torrent trackers and search engines need to be shut down, the folks behind this effort released it under a Creative Commons license, and people are being told that they "are encouraged to seed for as long as possible." As for Reznor himself? He notes that he's "blown away" and reminded (yet again) that Nine Inch Nails fans "kick ass."

But Bittorrent can't be used for any legitimate purpose, right? And musicians can't possibly embrace what the technology allows? Once again, we're seeing why those who embrace what technology allows will do just fine moving forward. It's only those who think that the answer is to bring out the lawyers and try to hold back progress who will find themselves struggling to create business models that work.

Reader Comments

Change culture

When I get into a discussion about reducing or removing copyright on things like music, the only point that people have that I have the hardest time convincing them is wrong is the question: "Why shouldn't these musicians make money on their music?" How would you (mike or anyone really) approach this point to allow me to try and convince more people that more copyright (at least with music) is not good.

Re: Change culture

"Why shouldn't these musicians make money on their music?"

Try "What's stopping them?" That usually throws people for a bit of a loop. Then you can use examples like this to show that copyright isn't necessary to make money off of music (and indeed, wasn't even available for most musicians, historically.)

Re: Change culture

Turn the question around. "Why aren't these musicians making money on their music?" Show the inquisitor the creative accounting systems that labels use to ensure musicians do not get any money.

Then say to them " The real question should be 'What can musicians do to make more money?'" and bring out examples of not only big name acts like NIN, but medium sized acts like Jill Sobule et al, and then the many smaller local acts that use technology to really connect with their fans and build a loyal fan base that supports them.

Of course, you always trot out Metallica (Napster, Bad!) who is just now recovering from their misguided attack on technology.

Re: Change culture

When I get into a discussion about reducing or removing copyright on things like music, the only point that people have that I have the hardest time convincing them is wrong is the question: "Why shouldn't these musicians make money on their music?" How would you (mike or anyone really) approach this point to allow me to try and convince more people that more copyright (at least with music) is not good.

That's easy. The two things are entirely unrelated. Just because there's copyright doesn't mean they get to make money off their music, and just because there's no copyright it doesn't mean they *don't* get to make money off of their music.

You can certainly point to examples like Reznor, where he appears to effectively be ignoring copyright, and yet put together business models where -- thanks very much to his music -- he's making millions.

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Trent is doing what people who have so much money that it no longer matters can do: ignore it.

Trent could stop tomorrow, buy a small island, and never do anything in public ever again, and he would still make the average person's yearly salary every couple of days for a long time to come, specifically because of copyright, royalties, and so on.

He is a great example only of how much money was made under the "old system".

As for But Bittorrent can't be used for any legitimate purpose, right? And musicians can't possibly embrace what the technology allows?, all I can say Mike is that guns, bombs, and such all have very narrow and very good uses. But like anything, the vast majority of their uses are to cause harm and to ignore other people's rights.

All of this could have been shared right off of a server, no bit torrent required. Amazing technology these servers.

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"Trent is doing what people who have so much money that it no longer matters can do: ignore it."

Okay, since you haven't done your homework, this one is kind of easy: Trent isn't nearly as wealthy as you're trying to make him sound. As of 2003 he was told that his net worth was estimated somewhere between 400k and 3mil. Hardly gobs and gobs of money, certainly not enough to kill the urge to make more.

"Trent could stop tomorrow, buy a small island, and never do anything in public ever again, and he would still make the average person's yearly salary every couple of days for a long time to come, specifically because of copyright, royalties, and so on."

Show me. Per everything I've read from Trent himself, the exact opposite is true. He was bilked by his label contracts and not properly informed as to what his royalty dues actually were.

"He is a great example only of how much money was made under the "old system"."

Prove it.

"all I can say Mike is that guns, bombs, and such all have very narrow and very good uses. But like anything, the vast majority of their uses are to cause harm and to ignore other people's rights."

Correct. All correct. The part you left out is that no one industry is actively attempting to shut down the makers of guns, bombs, or this elusive "such". If they did, several men in green camo uniforms would show up and explain why that wouldn't be allowed. Why, in this case, is it the other way around?

"Hey, why don't you run Techdirt only as a torrent?"

Winner of the nonsense comment of the day. The simple answer is that bittorent is an absolutely awful medium to distribute zero day information....

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As of 2003 he was told that his net worth was estimated somewhere between 400k and 3mil

Yes, this was due to some very crooked partners in his deal, not to mention that Trent spent much of the previous 5 - 8 years solidly in a haze of drugs and booze.

The value of the NIN catalog of songs is higher than 3 million, and the residuals he gets every year would be more than enough to satify most of the people posting here (including Mike). We won't mention the two or three world tours that NIN did with some seriously high ticket prices, which likely netted Trent serious coin. He could only do those tours at that level because of the work done to build up NIN over the years, in part by the "old system" which he shuns. It's the same story as Radiohead, pee all over the people who helped to make you what you are.

I do have to add this:

He was bilked by his label contracts and not properly informed as to what his royalty dues actually were.

Let's not forget that he was running his own label. Are you suggesting he bilked himself?

There is nothing current to indicate that Trent is anything other than a very wealthy man, who would never have to lift a finger again and still would live well off of residuals and such.

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"He could only do those tours at that level because of the work done to build up NIN over the years, in part by the "old system" which he shuns."

This assumes that the old system is the only way to build up a reputation. It's the old system that makes it more difficult for artists to build up a reputation by monopolizing public airwaves and cableco/telco infrastructure in a way that gives those who own the monopolies to such infrastructure incentive to ensure that most of the content on said infrastructure is owned by those who have the government granted monopolies on those information distribution channels. The old system is trash and needs to be replaced, intellectual property laws need to be changed to benefit the people and not just evil rich corporations, and the government needs to allow anyone to build new cableco/telco infrastructure and to regulate public airwaves in the best interest of the public.

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"Let's not forget that he was running his own label. Are you suggesting he bilked himself?"

You're right, I was incorrect, although he co-founded that label with the same crooked manager that ended up having to pay him 3 million in restitution for financial malfesience.

Either way, the point remains: Trent isn't poor, but he isn't buying any islands as you suggested, and you're account of how NiN got big is complete fabrication. Trent hated his label as early as 1991, and the album that made him famous was released under Nothing Records, the first label he started with Malm Jr., which was Downward Spiral.

So let's not pretend that this is an instance of Trent getting rich off the label's back and then suddenly turning his back on them...

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Think past the end of your nose. Can you imagine a struggling act making no money doing this? Can you imagine them not caring if other people profit from it? Can you imagine them continuing to work their McJobs while other people make out on their stuff?

Trent does it because Trent no longer cares about the bottom line, because the bottom line is already taken care of. It isn't like he needs any more promotion, is it?

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Can you imagine a struggling act making no money doing this?

Yes. In fact, lots of struggling acts release their work for free.

And, amusingly, when they do, you (and others like you) say "well, of course *they* would do it, they have nothing to lose." It's as if you don't even listen to yourself (no surprise of course, since you have already told us that you're not hear for actual engagement, but simply to purposely disagree with everything I say, no matter how ridiculous your argument might be).

Can you imagine them continuing to work their McJobs while other people make out on their stuff?

Who said anything about McJobs? Or about anyone else making money off their stuff? We've never said any such thing. We've focused on ways that musicians and content creators can use these techniques to make more money themselves.

Trent does it because Trent no longer cares about the bottom line, because the bottom line is already taken care of. It isn't like he needs any more promotion, is it?

I can say pretty definitively that this is simply not true. Reznor seems to care, quite deeply, about the bottom line.

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Mike, it's easy to disagree with you on this because your entire concept is based on ignoring simple facts in the game.

Trent Reznor doesn't need to do anything else in his life to live well and to enjoy all his days. Money isn't important, far from it, except perhaps in the way of a score card of success or failure. Even then, it isn't even key anymore.

Put simply, he can afford to be wrong often, be wrong big, and it doesn't matter.

We've focused on ways that musicians and content creators can use these techniques to make more money themselves.

You say this, and yet you so rarely show anything really successful. You come up with a few narrow cases, but you rarely discuss the wider implications. You tend to take the 30,000 foot view of everything, only drilling down on slam dunk cases, and not anything around them.

I don't see anything in this story that has anyone making money.

The rest, well, if we ignore all outside forces, if we ignore everything from bank acocunts to fan base (all courtesy of that horrible old shiny plastic disc marketers and sales), then yes, you may be right.

To me, your examples are always just missing reality. Your bittorent rants are the best. It's like a 100 unit apartment building with 99 crack houses and 1 retired woman living there, and you keep refering to it as a "fine retirement home". If you focus really closely on the one woman, or pull out to 30,000 feet so you can barely see the building, you may be right. But there are so many other things on the plate that make you wrong in so many ways.

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2. torrent files are best for large downloads that are downloaded in chunks to be assembled and viewed at the end without putting tremendous load on a single server, where as this is a text-based site that downloads pretty fast and doesn't need the benefit of p2p distribution.

3. comments to articles would appear all general to the torrent, and not within the content, so it would create a greater distance between the content and the conversation.

To wrap up, using BitTorrent to distribute TechDirt is just dumb. You obviously don't understand BitTorrent technology, it's benefits and downsides, or how to properly utilize it.

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"To wrap up, using BitTorrent to distribute TechDirt is just dumb."

Cut the guy some slack, the guys dad is probably a record exec, and he is probably in jr high (middle school) ... ;)

Like you I also noticed he seems to have no idea of how the internet works or of the various protocols or application types. He seems to think IPv6 will magically solve all the problems of the record labels, that spying on P2P and torrent users by ISP's will put an end to piracy, and that DRM and laws that make it illegal to break DRM will also magically solve everything.

So he is either a record label exec, a lawyer, or a child ... in either case I love his temper tantrums.

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Alan Gerow, techdirt would be perfect for a torrent. Just take all the posts for a day, turn them into a torrent, and let people download them. After all, it isn't like Mike runs this place as a commercial business or anything, right? I am being facetious, because Mike is trying to prove that Bit Torrent / P2P is all sunshine and flowers, rather than being mostly file traders, infringers, etc.

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1) I don't think Mike or any of the serious commenters here have ever suggested BitTorrent is all sunshine and flowers. It is a great technology that can and has been used for good business purposes.
2) BitTorrent is full of file traders because that is what it is for.
3)All analogies break down, but your blaming BitTorrent for copyright infringement is like blaming interstate highways for drug abuse because people use them to smuggle drugs.

Re: Re: Re: Change culture

Hey, why don't you run Techdirt only as a JPEG?
Hey, why don't you run Techdirt only as a zip?
Hey, why don't you run Techdirt only as a ftp?
Hey, why don't you run Techdirt only as a chat room?
Hey, why don't you run Techdirt only as an email?
Hey, why don't you run Techdirt only as an mp3?
Hey, why don't you run Techdirt only as a CD?
Hey, why don't you run Techdirt only as a DVD?
Hey, why don't you run Techdirt only as a vinyl record?
Hey, why don't you run Techdirt only as a cheese sandwich?

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All of this could have been shared right off of a server, no bit torrent required. Amazing technology these servers.

Amazing and insanely expensive. I’d like to see you try to serve 400 GBs of data to countless fans from your own servers. With BitTorrent, you can do it for virtually nothing (in fact, you need to seed the data yourself only once).

So, are you still going to try to argue that BitTorrent is evil? Seriously?

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And, last time I checked, while P2P doesn't run off of dedicated servers, each computer that hosts a file acts, to some degree as a sever. Its just a distributed network where each "server" has the file, but only shares a specific part with a particular swarm.

Re: Change culture

1. You can point out that its not the musicians that are pushing for overreaching and archaic copyright laws but its record execs. If its all about muscicians getting paid then why are all these measures putting more money in the pockets of nearly everyone but the musicians?

2. You can point out that if copyright laws get too far reaching and outrageous then you may have a problem with said laws severly limiting the way fans can access content. How can musicians make money if the fans can't access the music?

Re: Re: Change culture

1. Musicians often don't understand the implications of copyright, song writing credits, and all the other stuff that goes with it. They would likely push for more copyright protections if they could no longer make money from their music.

2. Such a severe limitation would be against EVERYONE's interests. Those limitations would be pretty much at the same level as absolutely NO copyright protections. The only way musicians would make money would be performing concerts, if they could get anyone to show up. The implications of no copyright are huge, and could potentially remove the concept of an artist being known world wide.

Remember, the price of the tickets is almost always directly related to the fame of the artist. How does world wide fame occur? It's like anything, it requires investment and efforts to market, to bring product to market in a coordinated manner that gets enough of the public interested in an artist for them to go "over the top" and get that global acceptance.

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Re: Change culture

What I really want answered is, "Why shouldn't I be paid today for the work I did 4 years ago?"

Come on people, where's my 'welfare' payments for the work I did last year/month/week? I mean I design and build documents and systems that are still being used today to make the company money, but they only paid me once for my work, not every time they use it. Can you imagine my outrage? How will my undeserving offspring ever become accustomed to the outlandish lifestyle they deserve (ie. doing nothing and getting paid for the work I did 10 years ago), if they aren't going to be getting paid for my work for the next 70 years?

[/sarcasm off]

As a society I'm hopeful that eventually we will realize that the amount of effort and resources that are being wasted on 'entertainment' could be put to much better use actually solving some of the bigger issues we are facing (food, shelter, basic health care, etc). But then we are all human, so I'm not holding my breath...

Well

Off the top of my head, I'd say "because MORE copyright DOES NOT automatically lead to MORE revenue." Ask them to show you where MORE copyright/laws leads directly to more money. They cant, because it doesnt, and never has. More copyright has NOTHING to do with making more money. Being more creative, leveraging technologies and innovating are more important and lead to more revenue than just having MORE copyright laws.

Re: Typo alert...

Cost savings

I wonder how much Trent would have had to spend (both time and money) to have this content produced in the traditional way? And now he's had it done for free by his fans, and has another piece of promotional merchandise out there that helps him connect with even more fans. Sheer genius. But of course without copyright he wouldn't have any incentive to make music, or any ability to make money, right?

Re: Re:

Respect is exemplified by acquiescing to the wishes of an author that are consistent with the strictures or law. One who purposely ignores those wishes is plainly selfish and should be taught proper manners.

Trying to turn the comment back on me is plainly disingenuous and ignores the actual issue at hand.

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Respect is exemplified by acquiescing to the wishes of an author that are consistent with the strictures or law. One who purposely ignores those wishes is plainly selfish and should be taught proper manners.

Hmm. Sharing content that you love and believe others would love as well, potentially driving more interest in those creators seems like it could be tremendously respectful. Hell, it seems a lot more respectful than keeping that content to yourself.

It all depends on how you look at it. That's the point we've been making. You seem to think that the law demands respect. I would argue that the law has nothing to do with respect at all. Actions command respect, not the law.

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There are many things I like and believe others would very likely feel the same were I to give them a copy. Even so, unless I have permission to do so I am showing a complete lack of respect for the author's wishes.

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There are many things I like and believe others would very likely feel the same were I to give them a copy. Even so, unless I have permission to do so I am showing a complete lack of respect for the author's wishes.

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"the "AA" groups."

what is an AA group?

"If that were true, why are they trying to shut down every BitTorrent tracker/search engine out there? Those take down the legitimate uses too, you know."

I would have thought this was extremely obvious. They are trying to shut down any distribution method other than the channels that they control. Its about control of the distribution of information to regain their monopoly status. Of course this is a total fail in the long run ... once most people are using VPN, encryption, etc.

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I would have thought this was extremely obvious. They are trying to shut down any distribution method other than the channels that they control. Its about control of the distribution of information to regain their monopoly status.

Re:

"Every author is entitled to exercise his/her choice, and whether or not one agrees is no excuse to ignore the wishes of authors who do not want their works distributed in this manner."

I hear this argument quite often, and I just have to say no, wrong. They exercise their choice when they release a work to the world. The world then will do with it what they please. It is only through a series of artificial boundaries that we've been accustomed to think that way.

It's as if I made the first washing machine, said this device should only be used for washing clothing, and then got upset when a couple guys used it to make a dialysis machine.

Control is only something you can exert over physical things that belong to you. Ideas, expressions, thoughts, and the like become a part of our culture once they are released. Locking them away is locking away and limiting our culture and it's expression.

Re: Re:

I hear this argument quite often, and I just have to say no, wrong. They exercise their choice when they release a work to the world. The world then will do with it what they please. It is only through a series of artificial boundaries that we've been accustomed to think that way.

It's as if I made the first washing machine, said this device should only be used for washing clothing, and then got upset when a couple guys used it to make a dialysis machine.

Exactly! This is the point I was trying to make to our lawyer friend above, who seems to think that the law requires respect. It does not. There are all different ways to get respect, but "because the law says so" doesn't make much sense.

What you are showing -- and what he apparently has failed to grasp -- is that true respect means not limiting human output and creativity.

Respect is in the eye of the beholder, but he seems to think that he is the final arbiter of what does and what does not require respect. I find that incredibly disrespectful. But I would never make some blanket statement about how others need to be respectful based on some made up standard.

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I find it quite interesting that a simple comment can generate such an over the top response. Moreover, I find the quote comprising the first part of your response also quite interesting.

My apologies for not responding directly to your point. My view is quite straightforward. It is for an author to decide what should or should not be done with his/her work if the work is made available to the public with certain attached limitations. The fact some may feel the author is being shortsighted is beside the point. It is the author who gets to make that decision, and not some anonymous third party.

If NIN wants to distribute its works without any limitations, then that is their prerogative. If someone else feels differently about their work, than that too is their prerogative. To imply that the former is laudable and the latter is not is, in my vernacular, disrespectful to the latter.

This is not rocket science. If a user does not like what strings are attached to a work, then the user should take his/her wallet elsewhere, instead of bellowing about all the things he/she is hindered from doing because of the strings.

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I find it quite interesting that a simple comment can generate such an over the top response. Moreover, I find the quote comprising the first part of your response also quite interesting.

You again appear to have totally missed the point. I had no idea you were so literal and needed things spelled out for you in such detail.

1. You insisted that there is only one way to properly respect someone.

2. I demonstrated why this was silly, by noting that I "felt" you had disrespected me by failing to answer my point. I did not really feel disrespected. The point was that respect is something that is in the eye of the beholder. You seem to think that this is not the case, and somehow "the law as measured by MLS" is the determinant of respect.

I am sorry to say that this is not how things work. Many people find it incredibly "respectful" to share content with others.

It is for an author to decide what should or should not be done with his/her work if the work is made available to the public with certain attached limitations. The fact some may feel the author is being shortsighted is beside the point. It is the author who gets to make that decision, and not some anonymous third party.

Again, this is your opinion, yet you state it as if it is fact. It is not fact. There are many ways to be respectful. Your determination of what is respectful is not the only way to determine it.

I never said that the author's shortsightedness made a difference. Again, you seem to have trouble grasping this.

This is not rocket science. If a user does not like what strings are attached to a work, then the user should take his/her wallet elsewhere, instead of bellowing about all the things he/she is hindered from doing because of the strings.

Likewise. This is not rocket science. If you do not wish to respect my comments, and choose to ignore the content of their responses, then you (the user) should go elsewhere, instead of making bogus comments.

Again -- do you see how this works? You keep making ridiculous statements and don't seem to realize it. Now I am mimicking your ridiculous statements back to you, in the hopes that perhaps you will figure it out.

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You wax poetic, all the while making light of my very simple point. It is not by any reasonable definition a sign of "respect" to do something that is in direct contradiction to the expressed wishes of an author.

If you believe otherwise then I submit you are subject to being characterized as part of the problem and not the solution. You say that you do not engage in illegal downloading and distribution, and yet you are willing to state that those who may choose to do so can be viewed as showing "respect" for an author by "sharing" the author's work with others.

Rather than hiding behind a disingenuous veil, why not simply come out and say that you choose to not break the law, but see nothing wrong with others doing so in the context of distributing copyrighted works over P2P without an author's permission?

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You wax poetic, all the while making light of my very simple point. It is not by any reasonable definition a sign of "respect" to do something that is in direct contradiction to the expressed wishes of an author.

Why?

If you believe otherwise then I submit you are subject to being characterized as part of the problem and not the solution. You say that you do not engage in illegal downloading and distribution, and yet you are willing to state that those who may choose to do so can be viewed as showing "respect" for an author by "sharing" the author's work with others.

Yes, they can be. Just as they can be viewed as not showing respect. My point to you is that "respect" is meaningless in this debate, and used to distract from the real issues. It's the same point you have brought up before. We had a discussion last year in which you stated a more moral world was one where everyone is worse off. I find that to be sickening and incredibly immoral that you would purposely make everyone worse off and consider that to be a better solution.

You can't argue the economic point so you fall back on "morals" or "respect" as if they mean anything. Both of those terms are totally subjective and entirely meaningless within this debate.

That was my point.

Rather than hiding behind a disingenuous veil, why not simply come out and say that you choose to not break the law, but see nothing wrong with others doing so in the context of distributing copyrighted works over P2P without an author's permission?

No, there are plenty of things wrong with breaking the law, but in this case, I can see their arguments as to why they do it, and I recognize that it is not going away, and fighting it only makes the problem worse. Why you have trouble seeing this, I do not understand. Why you choose to hide behind terms that are meaningless in this debate -- such as "respect" and "morals" while at the same time mocking us as "copyright whining baggers" is again hard for me to fathom.

Respect

Hi Mike and Anti-Mike,

Although I'm pro-copyleft and I'm producing a collaboratively written 'open-source' musical (www.opensourcemusical.com), at this stage I have to agree with Anti-Mike on this one. I agree that using other people's work is a form of giving kudos as it once was 100s of years ago when a composer would be flattered if another composer used his/her melody in their piece.

However if the author expressly wishes that others should copy him/her it seems right (and respectful) to me to honor those wishes.

I'm willing to be talked out of it though. I wonder if you are the same person playing two sides of an argument just to make a dialog interesting. Which is it.

You did a great presentation on Trent Reznor by the way Mike. Hopefully we can prove wrong all those who say 'This only works because he's big'.
Jade Wood
Opensourcemusical.com

Correction

There was an error in the release announcement. Only the artwork and photographs are released under the Creative Commons license.

We do not have the rights to release the finished work under any license - and nor did NIN, hence the "leak" of the material in the first place.

Whether or not potential rights holders want to kick up a fuss over this not-for-profit release remains to be seen. This is a very interesting gray area, one that the record companies could profit from if they choose to work with rather than ignore groups such as ourselves.

I never said I was "arguing" an economic point, so in this regard I believe you are mistaken.

Yes, morals and ethics do count. If one refuses to respect the wishes of an author then I submit such refusal exemplifies a moral/ethical compass in dire need of realignment.

It is useful to bear in mind that many of my comments are generally directed to what others may have posted in response to your articles.

I am not so naive that I am oblivious to what a significant segment of those using P2P are doing. I do, however, hew to the view that intentionally breaking the law is not the type of conduct that should be encouraged, either directly or indirectly.

Finally, I am curious why you continue to state you play by the rules that so many seem intent on ignoring, and then not hold them accountable in the least for having done so? And when they are held accountable and sanctioned by a court, you have an almost unerring tendency to attack the plaintiffs and the court, and not the defendants...the wrongdoers.

Re:

"Yes, morals and ethics do count. If one refuses to respect the wishes of an author then I submit such refusal exemplifies a moral/ethical compass in dire need of realignment."

I buy hundreds of products every year, and not once did I ever bother to consider the wishes of the company that produced them, nor did I ever get in trouble for failing to ask permission from them. I'm more than willing to bet that you're no different. Why should music or movies or video games or written words be any different? Have you done any renovation on your house? Asked the original builders if they like what you're doing?

"Finally, I am curious why you continue to state you play by the rules that so many seem intent on ignoring, and then not hold them accountable in the least for having done so?"

I've never eaten seal before. That doesn't mean I think people that have eaten seal are morally abhorrent.

"And when they are held accountable and sanctioned by a court, you have an almost unerring tendency to attack the plaintiffs and the court, and not the defendants...the wrongdoers."

Walk up to anyone you know and tell them that a middle-class woman was charged $1.92 million dollars for downloading 30 songs. If you find one person that doesn't attack the plaintiffs and the court, then you can come back here and argue your point.

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You would do well to read the entire history of proceedings in the JTR case before parroting the contents of other articles that are long on opinions and short on facts.

This would require an investment in time that would be very informative about the case, the facts presented at trial, and the likely eventual outcome when and as final judgement is rendered by the court.

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"""
You would do well to read the entire history of proceedings in the JTR case before parroting the contents of other articles that are long on opinions and short on facts.
"""

No. I don't care what the facts of the trial were. It's absolutely mind-numbingly stupid to even *attempt* to justify such an outrageous sum of money for such an innocuous "crime", where it cannot be proven (and can never be proven, short of mental telepathy) that *any* actual monetary harm was done.

Let us reduce the sum to a cool even million. Let us assume an average person makes around $50k a year (even though the average is *much* less than that). It would take 20 years to pay that judgement if all money earned went only to the judgement. There are murderers and rapists that don't get sentences that harsh. Now justify your position. Oh wait, nevermind, you can't, there is no rational justification, and I don't want to read your non-rational one.

Re: Re: Re: Re:

Fine then, go ahead and express righteous indignation without having taken the time learn the real issues and evidence in the case.

If you can put your indignation aside for a moment, you might want to review the numerous articles prepared by Mr. Ben Sheffner covering both the JTR and Tenenbaum cases.

Every attorney I know who followed the JRT case was stunned by the jury award. Most, including me, hold the opinion that it will be reduced by the court when it enters it judgement order. No matter what the eventual award may be, it seems likely that even a modest number would not satiate your desire to proclaim your indignity.

Like Tenenbaum, JRT should have fessed up and settled when she was caught with her hand deep in the cookie jar. Instead, she chose to pursue a course of deceit, obfuscation, tampering with evidence, lies, blame shifting, etc. It is hardly surprising that the jury was not impressed with her conduct.

Re:

"Yes, morals and ethics do count. If one refuses to respect the wishes of an author then I submit such refusal exemplifies a moral/ethical compass in dire need of realignment."

People laugh at the moment in Mel Brooks' The Producers when Franz Liebkind insists: "You are the audience! I am the author! I OUTRANK you!" Why? Because they recognize that being the author does not make you automatically right.

Exaggerated case in point: a musician releases an otherwise fantastic song which contains a brown note that causes the head of any kitten within earshot to spontaneously explode, and insists that said note is a vital part of the work that must not be altered.

Fans of the musician's other work then ignore that wish and produce a version which removes said brown note, replacing it with a similar tone harmless to kittens.

...Does that also "exemplif[y] a moral/ethical compass in dire need of realignment" on the part of the fans?

"Finally, I am curious why you continue to state you play by the rules that so many seem intent on ignoring, and then not hold them accountable in the least for having done so?"

Following the rules does not mean you believe that there is any benefit to society in their existence, nor does it oblige you to believe that there is any benefit to society in their enforcement.

Let me just step in here

Anti-Mike and Anonymous Poster...
Let me straighten out your viewpoint here because you have got it all wrong. Copyright is a legal bargain you make with the public for things to revert to the public domain after a certain time. Your music is only yours alone because we let you have it. Society believes knowledge belongs to the public. Its how society has survived for so long. Art is supposed to be knowledge of the soul and as an artist I share my soul with others, not for the money, but because it enriches me. Occasionally we as a society deem that your contributions are worth a bit more than others and we reward you as such. You greedy, arrogant self serving idiots seem to forget that we give you all your power. If we choose to ignore the laws because you have broken your trust, it is not our fault but yours. All the blame for pirating rests on the shoulders of the content owners, because we own it already and we are loaning you what we think of as the worth of that. Push the public enough to make us upset and we are going to punish you. This is why you are getting so much push back, you are wrong.

Copyright vs Public Domain... vs *Copyleft*...

Having read most of the comments so far, and at least scanned the rest, I need to add a quick bit of clarification. There seems to have emerged a polarisation between the copyright-and-make-money-by-imposing-restrictions commenters and the everything-should-be-completely-free-and-unattributed commenters. Well, everywhere you look on NIN's website and downloads you will see copyleft licenses (Creative Commons) which license specific forms of (re)use, under certain conditions (attribution and/or noncommercial-use and/or non-derivative-reuse) while opposing financial restrictions. It seems to me that by getting too passionate about their respective hobby-horses, both camps have lost sight of the forest, for the trees. You are both arguing about whether NIN (and all musicians/artists) should use licensing model "A" or "B", and not noticing that they (and *many* other artists) in fact use system "C". And for those arguing the naively one-dimensional point that non-copyrighted material leaves an artist with no opportunity for income, look at how big companies like Redhat Linux profit, from freely developed software (and a lot of that "free" development is contributed back by employees of those same companies)...